


if i lost you

by mockyrfears



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: M/M, Modern AU, Resurrection, very very very vague references to torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-05
Updated: 2013-06-15
Packaged: 2017-12-07 12:31:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/748536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mockyrfears/pseuds/mockyrfears
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He dreams of the grit of his father’s jaw, the indignation in his eyes as he surrenders his only living son to a stranger with cold, cold eyes,  a man who assures him he will be safe, so long as his father never lifts a sword against his King’s rulership again. Theon dreams of being so frightened, of being just a boy, scarcely of age, because he could not imagine his father keeping that promise.</p><p>He dreams of fearing that man’s sword, everytime he drew it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dalyeau](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dalyeau/gifts).



> soooo ray aka dalyeau have officially been rp partners for a year today so this is my gift from me to her. it doesn't nearly rival her's to me, but welp i tried. the robb and theon in it are from [blood and glory rp](http://bloodandglory-rp.tumblr.com/) but it's vague enough i think it passes as just modern au? idk enjoy~ i promise to finish this~

It starts in his dreams.

He dreams of castle he’s never seen before, but he knows, feels it deep in his bones that it’s Winterfell. There’s that same sense of wanting to belong, but never quite being able to, that exists in both places. He dreams of Rodrik’s fists, of Maron’s cruel jibes, his endless lies, just as they had existed in reality, he dreams of their deaths, but it’s not the sea that swallows them, its fire and bloodied blades and the cruel chill of the North. Theon dreams of being only a boy as he watches his home burning, he remembers the fear that grips him, as he quails in his mother’s arms as she weeps for the sons she has lost. He dreams of the grit of his father’s jaw, the indignation in his expression, humiliated as he bends the knee, surrenders his only living son to a stranger with cold, cold eyes, a man who assures him he will be safe, so long as his father never lifts a sword against his King’s rulership again. Theon dreams of being so frightened, still a child, scarcely of age, because he could not imagine his father keeping that promise.

He dreams of fearing that man’s sword, everytime he drew it.

When he wakes, it’s in a sweat, and he instinctively reaches for the body beside him, not even sure it’ll be there. Robb stirs, blinks at him tiredly, and upon noticing his apparent distress, throws an arm across Theon’s chest.

  
“Are you okay?” His voice is still groggy, not quite awake yet.

“Yeah,” Theon replies, pulling up the blankets that he’d apparently kicked off during his sleep. “Just a bad dream.”

“We all have those,” Robb replies, shuffling closer and tucking his head in the space between Theon’s jaw and neck. “Just a dream.”

Theon turns into his touch, wrapping his own arm around his waist.

In spite of Robb’s reassurance, Theon has the strangest feeling that it was much more than that.

**

Robb had told him that everyone has bad dreams, but the dreams don’t stop. If anything, they only get worse.

Much, much worse.

In his dreams, he sees the place he knows to be Winterfell burning, and he doesn’t know why, but there’s a horse screaming somewhere and somehow he knows that this is all his fault and he sees – he sees –

He sees Robb, bleeding, he sees the raw, red slash stretching across his neck, and oddly enough, that’s not the most terrible part of it all – it’s the cold disappointment he sees reflected in his blue eyes, the very eyes he’s so used to seeing light up at the very sight of him, the eyes that had once upon a time glowed with adoration, reduced to an icy hatred.

He sees a dungeon, he sees a knife in a man’s hand, he sees –

This time, when he awakes, it’s with a cry loud enough to wake Robb completely, and he sits up at the disturbance, blinking back sleep as he looks at Theon.

“Again?”

Theon nods – it’s the third time this week.

“Jesus, Theon,” He rubs at his eye – Theon remembers the ones in his dream – “that’s fucked up. Are you sure you’re okay?”

Theon reassures him that everything’s fine, that it’s nothing to worry about – just like he said, everyone has bad dreams, right?

He doesn’t fall back asleep that night.

**

He’s supposed to meet Robb for lunch, but his secretary informs him that he’s in the middle of an important meeting and that Theon will have to wait. Theon shrugs, snatching up a pen from her desk and only grinning in return when she offers him a glare. He’d intended to do the Sudoku in the crappy magazines outside Robb’s office, but finds himself doodling sea creatures on the side of the page instead. He blinks down at them once he’s filled half the page with them – drawing wasn’t really a particular hobby of his, even stupid doodles, and he wonders why the picture of a squid – no, more than that, those freakish ones you always saw wrestling whales or pirate ships beneath the sea in paintings – looks so familiar.

The door to Robb’s office opens, and Theon looks up immediately, a smile ready upon his lips –

It’s not Robb that exits his office, but a man that makes Theon seize up in terror.

It’s the eyes he remembers most, the pale, pale eyes, full of cold and cunning.

Robb shakes his hand, turning his head as he does, smiling at the sight of Theon waiting for him. The man, this stranger who is no stranger at all because Theon _remembers_ him, follows Robb’s gaze, regards Theon with a look so still, so cool that it sends shivers right down Theon’s spine. He feels sick. Before he even knows what he’s doing, he leaps out of his chair, runs straight to the toilet which he finds himself leaning over, retching his guts out. Robb follows him, after a few minutes, repeats the question he’s asked nearly every night this week – _is everything okay?_

This time, Theon doesn’t answer.

He’s not okay. Nothing is.

**

This time, when he awakes from his dreams, covered in a cold sweat and a scream on his lips because all he can think of is pale, colourless eyes, lips pursed in amusement, of the yelp of dogs, of a blade and –

When Robb asks the same old question this time, Theon pulls back the sheets and off the bed, making his way to the guest room without a word.

**

Robb calls Sansa, some days after that. Theon’s nightmares haven’t stopped, and each and every time Robb tries to comfort him, he flinches from Robb’s touch, slinks away to the solitary of the guest room, silent still.

“I think Theon’s sick,” he confides, wetting his lips as his gaze is drawn towards the room whereupon Theon is curled up beneath the duvet.

“Has he not been to the doctor?” Sansa’s voice is laced with concern, and he loves her just a little bit more for that.

“It’s not…that kind of sickness,” He reaches around with his free hand, scratching the back of his neck and lowering his voice. “He keep having nightmares.”

“Nightmares?” She sounds puzzled now, and he can’t blame her. “Everyone has those.”

“Not these kind. He doesn’t…” Robb flushes, can’t believe he’s really is going to say this to his little sister. She’s old enough to know now, he’s aware of that, she’s even caught them on that one humiliating occasion but – he’ll always think of her as a little girl, singing sweetly in her school play as Fiona as they re-enacted Brigadoon. “He won’t even share a bed with me anymore. He just… He just stays in the guest room all day, and he won’t talk to me. I don’t know what’s wrong.” He bites his lip. “I don’t know what to do. Something’s wrong but he won’t even talk to me.”

There’s silence on the end of the line for several moments, before Sansa speaks again, her voice softer this time.

“Everyone has nightmares.”

**

Robb goes to the guest room the night after that. The light isn’t even on, the curtain drawn in spite of the fact it’s only 3 PM. Theon’s lying on top of the duvet, staring blankly at the ceiling, he can see that much from the light pouring in from the hall.

“I’m worried about you, Theon.”

He doesn’t even reply.

Robb feels sick.

“I love you, Theon. But it’s like living with a ghost right now.”

That much, at least, earns him something that sounds more like a bark than a laugh.

“The ghost of Winterfell,” he says.

Robb doesn’t understand.

He can’t understand.

**

Sansa rings him first, as gentle as ever as she speaks into his voicemail, pleading with him to at least talk to her brother. He’s worried, she tells him, you should at least talk to him, tell him what’s wrong. She sighs, voice heavy with sorrow before she continues. “He loves you. You know that.”

Theon thinks of the bodies of two boys – only boys, barely more than toddlers – laid side by side in the dirt.

Alys calls him next, her voice nervous, full of trepidation after his voicemail message kicks in. “You need to get your act together, Theon,” she sighs, and Theon can tell she’s rapping her nails off the counter, same way she always does when she’s worried or angry. “Robb’s a mess trying to figure out what’s wrong. You shouldn’t…you shouldn’t do this to him, you know?”

Theon thinks of a body, bleeding from a hundred different wounds.

It’s Jon who calls him next, surprisingly enough. He must be ringing off Alys’ phone, Theon’s fairly sure he blocked his number after the dozen or so times he’d boasted about fucking his brother.

“If you don’t stop torturing my brother,” he snarls into the voice mail, “you’re a dead man. I don’t care what state you’re in, I’ll beat you bloody.”

It’s then that Theon remembers his name.

_Ramsay._

He leaves the guest room, but only to get sick again.

**

It’s a few nights after that Theon creeps into Robb’s room and there’s a glint in his eyes that Robb can’t quite place. Theon’s all teeth and tongue when he kisses him, biting at his lips as nails scrape down Robb’s chest, with more ferocity than Robb can ever remember.

Robb doesn’t care. He’s so relieved to have Theon back in his arms that none of it matters. Nothing but this, this – this is all he wanted, after weeks of feeling sick to the stomach with worry. He returns his kisses with equal fervour, allows Theon to strip him bare as he sucks warm, wet marks on his neck, his shoulders, across his chest.

“Theon,” he pants, awash with lust, awash with love.

Theon crawls up his body, nips at the shell of his ear before whispering huskily into it.

“You know I’d never betray you.”

Robb gasps and writhes beneath him, kissing his neck, kissing his jaw, kissing him, him, him.  


“I know,” he breathes, “I know.”

Theon wrenches away as if he was burned. The look he shoots Robb is full of venom.

“You don’t know,” he hisses, stumbling out of the bed. “You don’t know _anything_.”

Robb sleeps alone that night once more.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which progress is made, only to come undone again.

He should know better by now, but Robb still stops by the guest room in the morning, opening the door and hovering within the frame. The dim illumination from the light in the hall is the only way he can tell that there’s anyone there at all, but it proves to be just enough to make out the figure curled up beneath the duvets. Robb purses his lips, glances to towards the kitchen and debates just continuing on his mission to make some tea and toast but –

 _‘You don’t know anything’, Theon had hissed, pulling away from his touch as if scathed and fleeing from the room_.

Something churns in his gut, and he recalls Jon telling him that he does not deserve this, and yet –

He goes, he makes the aforementioned tea and toast, but rather than devouring them himself, he leaves them on Theon’s bedside table, sinking down onto the mattress himself with a sigh.

He’s not even sure If Theon’s awake or not, and he cradles his head in his hands, elbows perched firmly upon his knees.

“I don’t know if it’s me,” he admits, after several moments’ silence. If Theon’s heard, if he’s even awake, he can’t tell. “I don’t know if it’s something I said or did, or… If I only knew, then maybe I could apologise or something and we could try and move on from this. But I don’t _know_ , and that’s the worst part of it.”

His hands drop to his knees, and he stares at his open palms, blankly. He’s not sure he can bring himself to look over and see if Theon’s listening.

“If you… If you think you’re just going to drive me away like this, without a fight, then you’re wrong. I’ll leave, if that’s what you want, but I’m not going to bloody well – just abandon you because you can’t even be fucking arsed letting me know what’s wrong. Neither of us deserves that.”

He stands up, wipes his palms on his dressing gown. He still can’t look over his shoulder, he’s not sure he could bear what he might see there.

“Come back to me, Theon. You know where to find me.”

Just as he shuts the door behind him, he could swear he hears a choked _‘Robb_ ’, but he doesn’t have it in him to be sure.

**

He’s not sure what he’d expected to come of that visit to the guest room that morning, but it certainly had not been Theon crawling into his – _their_ – bed that night.

Robb’s hardly going to argue.

He turns onto his side, finds Theon propped up on his elbow, regarding him and breathing heavily.

“Hey,”

“Hey.”

Robb doesn’t know what else to say besides that, he’s too many questions to even try, but Theon beats him to the punch.

“Look, I’m… I’m sorry. I know, this isn’t…” he wets his lips, eyes trailing off into the distance. “…Easy.”

“Theon,” Robb reaches out, grasping Theon by the chin and forcing him to look at him. “I don’t care what – what you probably think I care about. I care about _you_ , and not knowing what is that you – what it is that’s doing this to you. I care about _only_ you, Theon, and I’m surprised you haven’t bloody well cottoned onto that fact yet.”

Theon meets his stare, and Robb does his utmost not to blink. He can show him this much. He _can._

Theon’s knuckles brush against his jaw.

“You ever get the feeling all of this has happened before?”

He seems more pliant now, at least, and Robb takes advantage of the fact, tucking an arm around his waist and drawing him in close, close enough to plant a kiss at the corner of his mouth.

“I told you before, we were meant to be.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Robb wonders if he’s pushing his luck, but Theon’s fingers skirt down over his abdomen, brushing over his boxers.

“What if I said ‘winter is coming’? Would that mean anything at all?”

It takes Robb a moment to reply, he’s too busy shuddering at Theon’s touch – he’s gone without it long enough.

“…Sounds like something my father would say.”

He catches Theon staring at him, but before he can even enquire, Theon snatches him by the hip and bicep, twists him over and straddles him. Robb blinks up at him – he really hopes this isn’t going to end the same way as the night before.

“Robb,” Theon murmurs, nipping at his lips. “Will you fuck me? Please. It’s been –“ And Theon doesn’t really need to tell Robb how long it’s been, he’s equally as aware, so he tangles his hand in the hair at the nape of his neck, tugs him in for a kiss that makes him come apart completely.

It’s slower than he’s used to – more tender, gentle, as if both are terrified that applying too much pressure might cause the other to break, to disappear, to pull away. For Robb’s part, he’s scared he might spook Theon, might be pushing his luck given how tumultuous the past few weeks have been.

But why Theon’s kissing _him_ with such shaky apprehension, as if not entirely sure Robb is there at all – he doesn’t know.

( _He couldn’t know.)_

He doesn’t let up, not even as it becomes gradually more heated – even as feather-light kisses are trailed down Robb’s stomach, all the way to his cock. Theon takes him in his mouth immediately, rather than his usual habit of teasing Robb, making Robb list all the filthy ways he wants to fuck him, before finally touching him.

Robb has to bite down hard on his own lips to keep the words he wants to say from spilling forth.

_Don’t leave me again. Don’t._

It’s him who’s on top now, thrusting three fingers in and out of Theon and trying _so_ fucking hard not to go insane because it’s been so long wanting this but –

Theon’ legs tighten around Robb’s waist, his eyes flying open so that blue meets blue and –

“ _Please._ ”

The whole time, Theon’s eyes do not close, not even as he moans, tightening around Robb and coming all over his chest. It doesn’t take much longer for Robb to follow, and he groans, collapsing on the mattress at Theon’s side.

“Fuck,” he pants, unable to summon words more fitting.

“I know,” Theon murmurs, turning to face Robb again.

Robb studies his face carefully, watching for any sign that Theon might bolt again. Fortunately, Theon simply sidles closer, throws an arm over his sweat-soaked chest and tucks his face into the space between Robb’s jaw and shoulder. Robb brushes his fingers over Theon’s clavicle, hardly daring to breathe, to speak. He’s fucking petrified that one wrong word and this – all of this – might vanish again, go back to Theon tucked away in a dark room and that impenetrable silence.

Thankfully, Theon doesn't appear to be going anywhere.

“….’m sorry,” His words are hot and muffled against Robb’s skin, and he pulls away just enough to be heard. “I wish… I wish I could explain. I feel like I’m going fucking crazy.”

Robb considers his own words for a moment.

“…why? I mean – look, I don’t mean to push you into telling me or anything – but I _love_ you Theon, you _know_ that. I’ll listen to what you have to say. Is it the nightmares?”

Theon’s silent for so long that Robb fears he may have pushed it too far.

“…They’re not just nightmares.  At least – I don’t – they _can’t_ be just nightmares.” He pulls away, but only to roll onto his back and stare at the ceiling. “Everyone has nightmares. This is – this is something different.” His breathing turns heavier, short, ragged breaths, and Robb lays a hand over his ribcage, soothingly. He sees Theon’s eyes slide closed, pain wrought on his face. Robb feels his own chest ache.

“We don’t have to talk about it tonight. It’s fine. It’s enough that you’re here, really.”

Theon turns onto his side, facing toward the wall, dragging the blankets up over him. Silence again.

And then.

“Just promise me something.”

“Anything.”

“Don’t trust Roose Bolton.”

***

Robb remembers that, weeks later. Strangely enough, it’s all he can think of – not about the pain, nor the worrying amount of blood that blossoms from his chest, unfurling like some hideous red rose. It’s with a strange and resounding clarity, unfathomably audible over the gunshot resonating in his ears and he touches his fingers to the wound, feeling dizzy when he pulls them away, sticky and hot and wet and red, so very red.

He feels strangely calm.

_Theon said don’t trust Roose Bolton._

He looks up, and cold, blue eyes meet his own. There’s no malice there, no cruelty, not even pity – nothing. Roose Bolton wasn’t a man given to bothering with such a trifling thing as emotions. He simply inclines his head, as if shooting Robb in the chest were a typical way of concluding their business meetings.

He leans in close, and Robb is dimly aware of the scent of fresh peppermint on his breath.

“The Lannisters send their regards.”

Robb falls to the floor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ....HAPPY BIRTHDAY RAYRAY :)))))))))))))))))))
> 
> (there's a final chapter to come dw dw~ i'm not leaving it like this)


End file.
